Ukraine and Neutrality
The largest issue that consistently bugged me with the discourse around the war in Ukraine is the concept of “neutrality”.
At first, it’s the conceptual confusion between what kind of neutrality people mean, political or military, and the assumption that they are not connected.
Then it is followed by the idea that you can implement either of them by just an abstract handshake agreement between the states and it will exist forever without the supporting mechanisms on its own.
Then there’s the question of what political neutrality could even mean in the case of Ukraine, and what restrictions on the sovereignty it could place.
The magical vision in which you can “just not enter NATO” and be left alone which is prevalent everywhere is idiotic, agreements of this nature always include some sizeable restrictions on sovereignty.
In the case of Ukraine, we necessarily talk about both types of “neutrality”.
Russia could have accepted Ukraine which can’t do anything militarily at all, but also is aligned to it politically which will fortify the first position. From these two preferences, the entire scheme of selling back Donbas was born from the start, and it’s the reason why the Ukranian liberal/nationalist position was either to reconquer the region or to completely cut it from itself to not make it influence political choices within the country.
On the other hand, one can pander to queries about how exactly said political “neutrality” could look. There were a lot of ideas from Mershmeir and people like him about the “rich neutral Ukraine” which was lost to the unreasonable politics of the West.
The fact on the matter is that “neutral” Ukraine has been a poor, dysfunctional, depopulating country that didn’t go through the 90s well, which was severely damaged by the Great Recession, the Euro crisis, the War in Donbas, and had problems with democratization and implementing both political and economic reforms which were keeping it in poverty and very little was changing, the hope of Ukraine was more or less on the foreign influence and foreign investments to fix its political system and economy like it has happened to all of its neighbors to the West.
On the other hand, modern Russia has been a country that has some peculiarities in its domestic and foreign preferences:
It generally doesn’t like free and open elections, fakes it domestically at the escalating intensity every coming year, and generally has an increasingly negative attitude towards basic democratic norms as such and an increasingly ugly attitude towards legality, ugly drift in the state cultural policy, and so on.
Most of its diplomacy is based on dealing with local oligarchies, has preferences towards it, and uses energy exports and subsidies as the main instrument of influence.
The base of pro-Russian groups tied to Russia was around the Southern and Eastern oligarchies which pandered to the “Soviet question” and were feeding on the decaying energy-intensive industries inherited from the Soviet Union.
One can try to build a narrative of what demands and restrictions RU may demand from Ukraine or anyone else in this scheme outside of the linguistic rights that everyone concentrates so much on.
There is a lot of talk from the more leftwing people, about how this war is not only and not even as much an ethnic and language conflict as the class conflict. It’s true, but paradoxically these leftwing people normally ended up selecting the socially and economically reactionary political groups that oppose the political freedoms, civil rights, and economic reforms to support.
Quoting the statement from Ischenko who is a main representative of his straight of thought and big representative of the internationally mobile professional class (comprador elites) who does not think that Ukraine is his homeland anymore since the war started:
The political capitalists – the ‘oligarchs’ who captured the commanding heights of the economy and the state, whom I discuss in Chapter 8 – were the camp of status quo, post-Soviet stagnation, while the ‘Western’ camp promised integration into neoliberal globalization. The agenda of the ‘Western’ camp refl ected the interests of the professional middle classes. Excluded from political capitalism, they aspired to the role of comprador bourgeoisie allied with transnational capital. The latter would benefi t from the enforcement of ‘transparency’ and ‘anti-corruption’, thus eliminating the main competitive advantages of Ukraine’s political capitalists. The ‘Western’ camp was also joined by those sections of workers who were integrated into EU markets primarily as migrant workers. But the prospect of Western capitalist competition repelled other large sections of Ukrainian workers, especially employees of the big post-Soviet industries and the public sector, to whom the ‘Eastern’ camp could off er at least some stability in the midst of the post-Soviet collapse, and who passively supported its rule without any enthusiasm for it.
— Towards the Abyss:Ukraine from Maidan to War
The support of “neutrality” always ends from everyone with the support for the local pro-Russian oligarchs, restrictions on political rights, and so on because it’s more or less how everyone who tries to think about the mechanics pictures it and desire to move away from them ends up as foolish destabilizing actions in all countries which are neighboring Russia at least since the mid-2000s.
Russia’s best hopes for a less ethno–nationalist and anti–Russian leadership in Ukraine would lie in two scenarios. In the first, the start of a formal EU accession process would incentivize Ukraine to rein in ethno–national extremists as it attempts to align with EU membership requirements. In the second, Ukraine would follow a path similar to Georgia after the 2008 war with Russia, with pragmatic leaders gradually coming to power who recognize that deepening commercial relations with Russia — while also seeking robust trade to Europe — is a path toward securing both their own fortunes and greater national prosperity.
One may contemplate why exactly Russia has preferences like this, whatever such preferences lead to good, stable political outcomes for the region, and so on.
Especially in opposition to the rhetorics about ascending Russia and declining America, Russia has had a bad decade in economic performance and not optimistic forecasts going forward (it’s one of the reasons why the military modernization failed far more than corruption), and as most other Eastern European countries are facing a rapid depopulating and aging which will diminish its role in the world and ability to project power.
Atop of material uncertainty, Russia has increasingly unsympathetic political and cultural moods and preferences. How do you maintain said neutrality in the face of it? By saying farewell to any dream of competitive elections, and better government, and hello to anti-gay sermons and semi-criminal political influence in your economy?
Intermezzo: Finland
You probably need to promise something good to the other side to make it buy in in its non-aligned position, instead of only threats of force and promise of suffering, poverty, and repression if you want to enforce neutrality on them.
The idea of “neutrality” often feeds from a homology and mischaracterized experience of Finland. The Soviets censored and controlled Finnish political life. Finland was a heavy presidential regime that was guided by Urho Kekkonen who was a personal friend of the Soviet leadership and got elected into position partly due to it (Finland stopped being a presidential republic after the collapse of the Soviet Union). However the Soviets were not opposed to the social reforms, were very happy about the Finnish economic development, and actively participated in trade with Finland, with Finnish companies having a massive preferential position in the Soviet trade, because the Soviet Union was dependent on the technology transfers through Finland (on which Nokia as the national champion was built).
Intermezzo: Cavalleria giapponese
Mearsheimer
Moreover, Japan acted with restraint from 1937 to 1941. Consider the major events of that period that are said to demonstrate its mindless aggression. The war against China, which began in 1937, was initiated by Chiang, not by the Japanese, who wanted to avoid armed conflict. The 1938 and 1939 wars were likewise not started by Japan, which recognized that it was in no position to defeat the Red Army, but by the Soviet Union. As for Tokyo’s advances into northern Indochina in 1940 and southern Indochina in 1941, both operations were undertaken because Indochina was the main conduit of arms to Chiang’s forces, and in both instances, Japan secured Vichy France’s consent before moving in.
— How States Think: The Rationality of Foreign Policy
by John J. Mearsheimer and Sebastian Rosato
First proposal
The following is a summary of the first Japanese peace proposal, which was approved by Germany. Trautmann handed this proposal to the Chinese government on November 5, 1937.
Autonomy for Inner Mongolia
A de-militarized zone between Manchukuo and northern China under Nanking government administration
A de-militarized zone in Shanghai with international police
The cessation of all anti-Japan policies
Cooperation between Japan and China against communism
Lower tariffs for Japanese goods
Respect foreign nation's properties and rights in China
Second Proposal
After lengthy internal discussion, the Konoe cabinet made the second proposal as follows:
Diplomatic recognition for Manchukuo
Inner Mongolia autonomy
Cessation of all anti-Japan and anti-Manchukuo policies
Cooperation between Japan, Manchukuo and China against communism
War reparations
Demilitarized zones in North China and inner Mongolia
Trade agreement between Japan, Manchukuo and China
Operation Zet
On September 26, 1937, the creation of department "Z" began, modeled on the department that conducted Operation "X" in Spain. Soviet military advisers and pilots were sent to China. More than 4,000 military personnel were involved in the operation.
On October 17, 1937, the delivery of military materials by trucks through Xinjiang on the route Alma-Ata — Urumqi — Hami — Suzhou — Lanzhou began. The route through Mongolia, which was twice as short, was also mastered.
During the operation, 82 T-26 tanks, 700 vehicles, 240 field guns, 20 anti-aircraft guns, 430 small-caliber guns and about 2 million shells for them, 300 machine guns, 3,600 light machine guns, over 40,000,000 rifle cartridges were delivered.
3,000 tons of bombs and ammunition, 1,000 tons of aviation cargo, and 1,430 tons of aircraft fuel were sent to China. The country received about 500 aircraft from the USSR. Among them were: 6 TB-3, 146 SB, 109 I-16, 8 UTI-4, 222 I-15.
The operation lasted until 1941, when it was curtailed due to the signing of the 1941 Soviet-Japanese treaty.
The Gift of Neutrality in the Future
People continue to cling to the idea of neutrality which could be achieved in future peace as something good for Ukraine and Ukranians are foolish in not agreeing to it.
The main problem with this is the lack of understanding that Ukraine is a really poor and depopulating country (instead of trying to use it as a rhetorical cudgel) that suffered immense economic and demographic shock at the start of the war already which couldn’t have been avoided if they signed the agreement even in the first few days because they economy would still crater, the birth rates would still collapse to some degree (the country already had very low fertility rates, close to the bottom with East Asians), the outmigration would still happen on a quite notable scale.
The invasion itself caused massive damage to the country even at the start and the country already needed a massive amount of money to repair the damage, it’s one of the reasons why the government probably went va banque.
Now after the years of the war, waves of outmigration, massive economic damage, and extremely low fertility rates and levels, the country and the population need massive amounts of money to not end in a humanitarian catastrophe and at least fund pensions and welfare for the disabled and reestablished at least some normality. Signing the peace agreement without at least quite sizeable foreign support would lead to poverty and mass exodus from the country.
Russian neutrality once again doesn’t seem to promise good things, but poverty, exodus, and increasingly weird political rhetorics. Some people view it as the goal of the entire enterprise, but it’s not what most people think will come with “neutrality”.
One can view this as a fundamental problem of Russian foreign policy, Russia is not a very nice country. You can participate in a bilateral trade, and sign some preferential contracts on energy exports. However, it doesn’t have a lot to promise for which you may strive on a political, economic, and cultural level as people want, for which you may want to commit in full (it goes to the closest allies).